


Little peices of time

by Anonymous



Category: Life Is Strange (Video Game)
Genre: Self-Doubt, Self-Esteem Issues, Self-Hatred, Self-Reflection, Time Travel, Time looping, being in a time loop is not a fun time, snippits
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-14
Updated: 2020-03-14
Packaged: 2021-03-01 04:26:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,460
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23139202
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: this is not the first time Max has traveled back in time, and it will not be the last. Max does not always remember that this is not the first time.
Kudos: 5
Collections: Fanfic Anonymous





	Little peices of time

_ She wakes up in Jefferson's classroom. The dream she had been having was very surreal. Strangely urgent. But what would she be doing at a lighthouse during a storm? _   


* * *

  
  
Strong bathroom cleaning chemicals burn the nose and made Max tempted to tuck her face in her t-shirt to avoid smelling it. The picture of a butterfly, clenched in hand, eyes wide in horror. A gunshot, a thud, blood spilled across the floor. Bile rises in the throat, alongside despair.    
  
Max Caulfield is frozen in time.    
  
She reaches her hand out, as if she could take her inaction back.    
  
She wishes-   


* * *

**She went back to let Chloe die. Chloe had asked for it, and she had intended to go through with it. She can't prevent herself from reaching out for her friend, and triggering her power one last time.**

* * *

Jefferson's lecture drags on, but Max can't find it in herself to be interested.    
  
She doesn't attract any attention to herself, and gets out of class, and goes to her dorm. She has a fight with Victoria, a good chat with Warren, and wonders what is wrong with Kate. She seems so down lately.    
  
All in all, its a normal day, until she learns that Chloe Price, her childhood best friend, died in a bathroom today.    
  
She reaches her hand out as if she could take today and erase it into nothing.    
  


* * *

-for more time-

* * *

  
Watching the scene play out in the bathroom again, Max has to admit she is terrible at planning ahead. Surely she could have used the time she spent waiting to smash the glass.    
Or at least found something to smash it with. The hammer is a stroke of luck, really.    


* * *

Max is a shitty liar. Oh she can misdirect with the best of them, and can lie with prior planning, but she is absolutely terrible at improv. She wants to tell principal Wells about the gun, but that also involves telling about the scent of blood and bathroom cleaner, and the red stain on the floor that no longer exists. She couldn't separate the two if she tried. But she tries to tell him, because Nathan could have(/did/but didn't anymore) killed someone, and she can't risk her silence killing someone again. She doesn't know if it will help, but she has to try.   
  
She's kind of a terrible person, but this is about more than her.    


* * *

_ But there is something else she has forgotten _

* * *

The breeze smells pleasant, even though Max feels nervous at being a model for art, it's a happy memory. She's self conscious, but too relieved to really care. The sound of pencil on paper, a gentle breeze on her skin, grass smell, and the gaze of a safe artist on her.    
  
It's a peaceful memory, after the drama of the morning, and she thinks of it longingly later.    


* * *

Max and Victoria do not get along.   
  
When she blocks the way, Max has no qualms about being a bitch, and setting the sprinkler off on them, then taking a photo of Victoria wet.    
  
Max is very aware she is a selfish and self-absorbed person. It haunts her thoughts In her darker moments.   
  
"I am a terrible human being. Why am I here?"   
  
It does not stop her from escalating it at every opportunity.    


* * *

_What about the storm?_

* * *

  
Max is not very attentive to other people. It's one of her worse failings, that she spends so much time in her own head that other people fall by the wayside.    
  
Another one is that she is incredibly nosey, and often forgets manners in favor of looking through people's stuff.    
  
She looks and thinks at least a little about perfectly mundane things. She especially can't resist reading. She knows the dorm map pretty well.   
  
She doesn't talk much with Juliet , but the name Juliet Watson comes to mind a lot easier then Juliet does. Dana's room is across the hall from Juliet Watson.    
  
This is an exception. Most people do not frequently use their last names, or wear name-tags to tell you what name goes with their face, so Max relies on voice.    
  
It's a bit nerve racking to think of someone's name on the spot, but Max manages better with pressure some days. Pressure makes decisions unpredictable in helpfulness, but does motivate Max into action.    
  
Max’s third biggest failing, or around deadlines, her biggest failing, is her passivity and inaction.    
  
Max’s noisiness brings her a start to a friendship with Juliet and kicked out of the room by Dana on the same day.    
  


* * *

Always take the shot

* * *

Standing there with a photograph in hand, Max Caulfield has proof that she is a terrible person. She's passive and it hurts people. It's a bitter pill to swallow, and she vows to do something to make it up to Kate.    
  
What she could possibly do to make up for this eludes her.    


* * *

Sometimes Warren makes Max nervous. She likes him as a friend, and is desperately trying to be oblivious to the fact that he might want more. She doesn't want that with anyone, doesn't understand why anyone does want that. It just seems weird to her.    
  
The thing is, Max thinks he would be understanding, but doesn't know how to spit it out to him. What if he wasn't, and she was wrongly assuming things, and it makes things awkward. She likes having him as a friend, and really does not want to make things weird if there's nothing going on.    
  
  
When Nathan Prescott comes after her (she should have known better than to have left a torn up selfie on the floor, that was just stupid.) Warren held him off for her. Was this a friend action, or did it symbolize more.    
  
Before she was rescued by the truck that parks in handicapped parking lots. Inside was a potential victim. She speaks, and Max starts in shock as she recognizes her best friend's voice. Well, former best friend.    
  
Chloe is justifiably mad at her, because Max Caulfield is inattentive and a terrible person.    
  
She still drives them home. Chloe's house had been her haven. It smells so familiar, and something in her uncoils, and she smiles. At least until Chloe smokes her weed, and Max wrinkles her nose.    
  
But soon there are other things to focus on. Like not being a klutz. She uses time-travel to successfully hide in the closet, like she used time-travel to save Alyssa, and fix the globe.    
  
She hides in the closet, and cowers as Chloe argues with the security guard from earlier. He hits her, and Max reaches out. Suddenly the closet is open, and the door is open, and Max blinks. She can use her power to go back and fix social screw ups. So far she has been more focused on the physical side of things, mostly her clumsiness, saving things, and photo-opps. She wishes she could go back and intervene with Kate and this guy, (or fix things with Dana) but with it now, she has a chance to be the friend Chloe needs.    
  
Which involves taking the blame for weed (if it were anyone else she wouldn't have, but this is what best friends are for).    
  
Chloe is ecstatic, and Max is feeling guilty. She wouldn't have needed time travel for this if she wasn't a terrible person in the first place. 

* * *

Max really wishes she had the foresight to throw the weed out the window.    


* * *

If there is one thing Max will never forget it is the storm. She dreams of it constantly. She will also never unsee Kate jumping, and the sound of a gun, will forever be traumatic for her.    


* * *

_ She went back to let Chloe die. Chloe had asked for it, and she had intended to go through with it. She can't prevent herself from reaching out for her friend, and triggering her power one last time.  _   


* * *

**She wakes up in Jefferson's classroom. The dream she had been having was very surreal. Strangely urgent. But what would she be doing at a lighthouse during a storm?**   


* * *

The smell of Rachel Amber's rotting body mixing with garbage is burned into her Olfactory brain. She remembers that scent every time she sees Chloe cry. Chloe is perfectly capable of crying for good reasons, but still Max smells Rachel Amber rotting in garbage, and it’s horrific that her memory has linked these two sensations together, that this is how Max will forever remember Chloe's Rachel. That their bond will evoke this reaction in Max.   
  
It's getting harder to remember the good memories. 

But they are there. They have to be there, somewhere.

* * *

_ She wakes up in Jefferson's classroom. The dream she had been having was very surreal. Strangely urgent. Something about a storm?  
_

**Author's Note:**

> Max's powers were strongest when she first used them, moving time, and her body back into Jefferson's classroom. The rest of the game didn't play like that, so I came up with a theory, that the events of the game are one of Max's last loops, and that her powers have been losing strength and abilities, from the many times she has reset things. Max herself has been forgetting things in the many loops with her fading powers. Such as her original intent being stopping the storm, as gets caught up in her life. 
> 
> So here are bits from the other timelines


End file.
